What is RealNav?RealNav is a database built upon the navigation data
produced by aviation authorities worldwide, and
gathered by Lufthansa Systems. It contains
current real-world global information about airports, runways, enroute
and terminal waypoints, VHF navaids, airways, instrument
approaches (including WAAS), departure procedures (SIDs),
arrival procedures (STARs), and airspace frequencies.

Is It accurate?The data used for building the RealNav database is the
same real-world data used by GPS vendors and aircraft
manufacturers around the world, so it is as accurate as the data
provided to those types of companies. Contact your
individual software vendors to determine how RealNav data is
utilized with their software.

How do I check my
Redbird FMX RealNav subscription status and either
purchase/renew?
Applying RealNav Data to your FMX is a simple process, see
the instructions by clicking on this
link.

Can The Data Be Updated?Revisions to the database are available
as part of your subscription at predefined intervals,
depending on the type of license you purchase.
Home-use licenses are updated quarterly, while professional
licenses have two update updates: all standard AIRAC cycle
updates, or quarterly updates.

Can I Edit The Data Myself?
No, the database exists in a proprietary format.

How Much Does A
Subscription Cost?
RealNav Home Use - $39.95 RealNav
Professional (4 Cycles) - $495.00
RealNav Professional (13 Cycles) - $995.00

How Long Does My Subscription Last?
RealNav subscriptions last for one year.
The number of updates during the subscription
period varies based on the type of license you purchase:
Home vs Professional.

Why Do You Offer Home vs Professioanl
Pricing?The data is very expensive to gather and scrub. It takes
the efforts of a large team to provide a usable and accurate
database every 28 days. Under normal
circumstances, only professional pricing would be available.
However, we recognized that many people who use home-based
simulators for practice and entertainment like to have
access to real-world data. But the cost of
real-world data can be prohibitive for a home user, so we offer
a home-user license to non-professional users for a substantially reduced
price. Flight Schools and certified training
operations using simulators compatible with RealNav data
must purchase the professional license.

Can This Database Be Used
In A Real Aircraft?
Although our source for this database is identical to what
is used in many real-world aircraft, the RealNav database is
for simulator use only.

How Does The Professional
License Price Compare With Updating A Real Airplane?
The price an aircraft owner pays for a GPS data update is
typically only for a particular region of a particular
country. RealNav is a global database, not just
a regional one, but our pricing is actually less than if you
were able to update your aircraft's GPS system with all
available GPS regions worldwide. However, realize that many
real-world GPS systems do not have enough onboard memory to
load the entire global navigation database; but your
simulator does!

I Use Another NavData
Database, Can I
Convert to RealNav?
The
GPS avionics in your simulator must be updated by their
respective software manufacturers to become compatible with
RealNav data. So you must first ensure your
avionics vendor supports RealNav as a data source before
your purchase data from this site. Contact the
makers of your software to find out if they are compatible
with RealNav data.

Can RealNav add the ILS to
my airport?The data from this site only updates your
RealNav-compatible GPS.
This means you get information about waypoints, altitudes,
and frequencies for approaches, arrivals and departures,
including LPV/WAAS. But what RealNav does
not change is the scenery
in FSX or Prepar3D. The word "scenery" can be a little
misleading. In FSX and Prepar3D, the scenery includes
things you can see outside the airplane like trees, runways,
rivers, and terrain. But it also includes some
"invisible" things like glideslope transmiters, localizer
transmitters, VOR transmitters, ATIS transmissions, etc.
So if our data tells your GPS that an ILS exists at a
certain airport on a certain frequency, we expect your
scenery to have been updated separately so that the ILS
actually exists. A good analogy is to think
about how you update the GPS in your real world aircraft.
If the GPS update says an ILS is present somewhere, the
assumption is that the town that owns the airport actually
installed the ILS that they said would be there, or issued a
NOTAM that the ILS was out of service.

How Is This Data Different
from Other 3rd Party Navigation Databases?
Other available databases have known limitations regarding the number of
airports and approaches they contain. Many
non-precision approaches are not even present in those other
databases, and updates to real world data are slow
to reach them. Many do not contain information about WAAS appraoches or airspace,
but RealNav does. RealNav data comes from Lufthansa
Systems, one of only three Level-1 providers of this type of
data, so there is much more data in RealNav than in any
other simulator data vendor's database.